[Congressional Record Volume 148, Number 22 (Tuesday, March 5, 2002)]
[House]
[Pages H680-H685]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
THE BUDGET AND THE DEBT CEILING INCREASE
The SPEAKER pro tempore (Mr. Crenshaw). Under the Speaker's announced
policy of January 3, 2001, the gentleman from Texas (Mr. Stenholm) is
recognized for 60 minutes as the designee of the minority leader.
Mr. STENHOLM. Mr. Speaker, this will be another in a series of 1-
hours that the so-called Blue Dog Coalition is taking to focus on the
budget, to focus on the request of the administration to raise our debt
ceiling by $750 billion. We want to continue to talk about this.
I want to make it very, very clear that we, the Blue Dogs, are
willing to support a temporary increase in the debt limit to meet the
expenses of the war and to allow government to meet its obligations;
but we suggest holding off on a long-term increase in the debt ceiling
until we have a plan in place to return our country and our fiscal
affairs to balance.
{time} 2000
I remind everyone that it was less than a year ago that we stood and
debated on this floor of the House the economic game plan that we were
going to follow for the next year and the next 10 years. I remind
everyone just briefly that the Blue Dogs felt that we ought to be
conservative with the $5.6 trillion projected surplus just in case it
was not real, just in case something of an emergency nature might
occur, just in case those who projected that surplus might be wrong.
We suggested that we ought to take half of that $5.6 trillion
projected surplus and pay down the debt. We were told by our friends on
the other side of the aisle and the administration that they were
concerned about paying down the debt too quickly.
Well, I do not know where they got that information, but now all of a
sudden the President's budget that he has submitted to the Congress
this year projects deficits and the utilization of the Social Security
trust fund for the next 10 years. I repeat. The President's budget
proposes using Social Security trust fund dollars for the next 10
years. That is the economic game plan that we are under tonight.
The Blue Dogs are suggesting that we ought to sit back, the Congress
and the President, and our friends on the other side of the aisle need
to sit back and roll up our sleeves and have an honest discussion about
what we need to do to put our budget back in order. We need to have a
serious discussion with everything on the table. The preceding speaker
opened his remarks in just that vein, and there are a large number of
Democrats who are willing to sit down and try to put our fiscal house
back in order, but that offer has to be extended and so far it has not.
The bottom line tonight is that we are being asked to increase our
debt ceiling by $750 billion. That means we are going to have to borrow
or it is suggested that we need to borrow that amount of money. In the
conduct of the war, we are perfectly willing, if that should be the
decision of the President, to borrow the money to fight the war.
There are some that suggest that maybe, just maybe, we ought to
consider paying for it, because when we borrow it today we are saying
that this generation does not wish to pay for that which we are
enjoying, but we are perfectly willing to send that obligation to our
children and grandchildren. That is part of the discussion that we wish
that we were having on this floor tonight.
We have made it very clear we are willing to participate in a
meaningful dialogue, a meaningful debate in which we can have ideas and
suggestions put forward as to how we get from where we are to where we
need to be. Where we are today is we are back into deficit spending. We
are back into spending the Social Security trust funds when after I
think last year five times, five times we voted on this floor
unanimously a lockbox on the Social Security trust fund. I guess we did
not mean it.
The Blue Dogs when we were on the floor last year talking about the
economic game plan that we suggested not only suggested that we ought
to take that $5.6 trillion surplus and devote half of it to paying down
the debt, 25 percent of it to cutting taxes, and 25 percent of it to be
spent on the priorities of this Nation.
What were those priorities? Fixing Social Security, fixing Medicare,
dealing with prescription drugs, dealing with the educational problems
of this country. We believe and still believe that we could do what we
needed to do with that amount of revenue, and then we proposed cutting
taxes with 25 percent of that proposed projected surplus.
Well, we lost. We came up 14 votes short, I believe was the number.
And under our system of government, when you lose, you go on to the
next round.
Well, here we are into the next round being asked to increase the
debt ceiling by 750 billion additional dollars. We say, whoa, let us
not do that much at one time. Let us not admit that this body is not
capable of working with the other body and working with the President
and putting our fiscal house back in order and balancing our budget at
a time certain. We are perfectly willing to deal with spending caps,
with pay-go so long as everything is put on the table so we might have
an open and honest dialogue and then get a vote on the issues in which
we are concerned.
Now what does the debt ceiling mean to the average person watching us
tonight? I know many times when you listen to us you get very confused.
But, basically, it is a businessman going to their lender. It is a
student going to their parents, having run up a $6,000 credit card
bill. Of course, the parents will pay because they do not want the
kid's credit damaged in the long run, but they will work out the
arrangement that includes reducing the allowance, getting a part-time
job, and getting promises for less partying, et cetera.
The worse thing that we are doing with our accumulated Federal debt
is the reverse of this scenario. Parents are going to the students with
their bills and expecting the youths to pay for their elders'
irresponsible consumption. A businessman that reaches his credit limit
at his bank needs to go to his banker and say, I need to borrow
additional money, I have this great investment potential, I have got
this great idea, and you convince your banker that you have a plan that
will pay him back not only what you have borrowed up to this point but
also will pay back that which you are intending to borrow in upping
your credit limit.
[[Page H681]]
That is what we are trying to focus on tonight as Blue Dogs, a plan.
If Members want to increase the debt ceiling, tell us how they are
going to get the budget back into balance in a time certain and in a
short time. The economic plan that we are under tonight says 10 years.
Ten years we will stay in the Social Security surplus; and then,
remember, baby boomers begin to retire in 2008. 2008, that is not very
far from tonight. In 2011, we begin to have the baby boomers retiring
in earnest. That is not very long. We cannot afford to continue to go
into the Social Security trust fund without coming up with a plan for
how we are going to fix Social Security and Medicare for the future.
That is what we are going to be talking about tonight.
Mr. Speaker, I yield to the gentleman from Arkansas (Mr. Berry),
another one of the true leaders of the Blue Dog Coalition. He has been
focusing not only on budget but health care matters and on agricultural
matters.
Mr. BERRY. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for yielding me this
time. I appreciate the gentleman's great leadership in this House of
Representatives over many years. Almost from the beginning, he has been
a great champion of fiscal responsibility. He was one of the founders
of the Blue Dogs, and fiscal responsibility is our hallmark, and we are
very proud of it.
Mr. Speaker, I cannot begin to tell you this evening how heartbroken
I am that we are here on this floor yet again tonight to talk about the
fact that this country simply cannot live within its means. It is a
heart-breaking thing to know that we continue to run up bills, borrow
money, pass the debt on to our children and grandchildren and tell the
American people everything is all right, do not worry about it. That is
what is going on.
Mr. Speaker, I have to ask: When is this going to stop? How long are
we going to allow this to go on? When I came into this House in 1997,
that was the last time we had a vote to raise the debt ceiling. We
worked hard to create a situation where we would have money to pay off
the debt that this generation has accumulated, and we have nothing to
show for it.
We worked hard in this House to get a balanced budget and to
accumulate a little bit of a surplus and to create a situation where we
would have the ability to pay off this debt. Just a year ago, in a Blue
Dog meeting, the gentleman that is the director of the Office of
Management and Budget, the President's bookkeeper, the President's
accountant, came to the Blue Dogs, and I will never ever forget his
statement. He said, our greatest fear is that we will have so much
money that we will pay off all of the debt, and no one will have a safe
place to invest their money because you will not be able to buy a
United States treasury bond.
I almost embarrassed myself by laughing out loud right in front of
him. I thought it was the most ridiculous statement I had ever heard
because his plan was to create the situation that we have today. He
told the Blue Dogs we are not interested, count us out when you talk
about taking this surplus and taking half of it and paying down the
debt because we do not want any part of that.
We said, let us take a fourth of it and reduce taxes. We thought we
should do something about the marriage tax penalty and the estate tax,
and I still think we should have. Then we said, let us take a fourth of
it and deal with some disparate spending priorities that we feel that
we need to deal with. To achieve the balanced budget and the surplus
that we had at that time, we had basically train-wrecked the senior
citizens health care system because we have created a situation where
the health care providers in this country are not going to continue to
provide health care to our seniors for the small amount of
reimbursement that they get. They are just not going to do it. We are
about to ruin the health care system in this country for our seniors.
We do not have any money for prescription drug benefits.
We wrote a farm bill to try to balance the budget that bankrupted the
entire agricultural community of this country and has cost us far more
than we ever intended or a responsible farm bill would have cost us had
we done it right.
The long-term interest rates in this country have not gone down, even
though we have done everything that we know to do to try to drive them
down, and that is an indication that Wall Street and the world's
financiers do not want any part of this.
{time} 2015
They know that we are borrowing money that we cannot pay back. They
know that we are passing an economic burden on to our children and
grandchildren that they cannot bear.
What is going to happen? We have already spent all of the Social
Security trust fund. We have spent all the Medicare trust fund. All the
money is gone. And now we are being asked to raise the ceiling on the
amount of money above that that we can borrow: ``Let's spend all the
money we can get our hands on and then borrow some more to go with
it.'' And what are we going to have to show for it? Nothing. We have
not built a road. We have not built a school. We cannot point to
anything that we have accomplished.
Mr. Speaker, I carry this buckeye in my pocket. It is a relatively
worthless little nut off a small bush in Arkansas. The squirrels will
eat it sometimes. Nothing else will. Folklore has it that if you take
that little nut and carry it in your pocket and rub it just right with
your thumb, the oil from your skin will make it shiny and the shinier
it gets, the better your health will be. It will protect you from
rheumatism. It will protect you against all kind of evil spirits. And
it will bring you good health. Mr. Speaker, that is what the Medicare
system is going to look like in 15 years, because we have squandered
the opportunity to make Medicare and Social Security whole and make
sure that they are here so that our children and grandchildren do not
get stricken by a horrible tax burden.
Let me read to you what the GAO Comptroller General, David Walker,
said just a few days ago: ``Absent substantive reform of the
entitlement programs, a rapid escalation of Federal spending for Social
Security and Medicare and Medicaid beginning less than 10 years from
now is virtually certain to overwhelm the rest of the Federal budget.''
We are not going to be able to do anything but pay for Social
Security and Medicare and pay the interest on the national debt. That
is not a secure Nation. It is not a responsible Nation. It is something
that we should not allow to happen. The Blue Dogs are overwhelmingly in
favor of doing whatever we have to do to fight the war and the
recession. But we are not willing to give the administration, or anyone
else, a blank check and say, go borrow all the money you want to
borrow, pass the debt on to our children and grandchildren and not even
have a plan as to how we are going to deal with it. They do not even
want to talk about a plan. They just say, just keep borrowing money,
just keep cutting taxes more and more, and hope for the best. This same
Comptroller General makes the comment that you cannot grow economically
fast enough to take care of this problem once it reaches that
particular spot that he was talking about.
It is time for us as a Nation and it is time for this House and this
Congress to be responsible and sit down and work together for a plan
that will provide for the responsible fiscal operation of this country.
Mr. STENHOLM. I thank my friend from Arkansas for those remarks. I
want to remind everyone now what we are all about tonight. We are
saying that to increase our debt ceiling without a plan for getting us
back into balance is irresponsible. We are prepared to vote to increase
the debt ceiling short term. We do not want to see our country default
on its debt. We do not want that; no one wants that. But we do believe
it is irresponsible for us to blindly follow an economic game plan that
has squandered $5 trillion of surpluses without first dealing with the
problems of Social Security and Medicare. We think that is
irresponsible. And we hope that as a majority of this House puts
together their budget, this year we would hope that we could be a part
of it.
We are here tonight saying that if you participate in a budget
process that gives us a plan to get us back into balance in a
reasonable period of time and that keeps us in balance, we will support
it. We will support it. But we will not support increasing the debt
limit by $750 billion by not only continuing down the plan area that we
are
[[Page H682]]
into tonight but actually making it worse as the budget that has been
presented to Congress projects to do. That, we will not do.
I yield to the other gentleman from Arkansas (Mr. Ross), one of our
newer Blue Dogs, to discuss this issue that we bring before you
tonight.
Mr. ROSS. I thank the gentleman from Texas for yielding.
When I tell people I am a member of the Blue Dog Coalition, they ask
me, what is the Blue Dog Coalition all about? I tell them that we are
about being fiscal conservatives.
I come from 10 years in the Arkansas State Senate where I helped
balance the State budget for 10 years. My wife, Holly, and I own a
small business in our hometown of Prescott, Arkansas, a town of 3,400
people. We know what it is like to meet a payroll every Friday. We
know what it is like to live within a balanced budget at our small town
family business. And I do not think the American people expect anything
less of those of us in the United States Congress, those of us that are
setting out the vision and the priorities for the future of this great
country. That is what the Blue Dogs are all about, being fiscal
conservatives.
I can tell you something else that I am about and I think the Blue
Dogs are about, and, that is, we are sick and tired of all the partisan
bickering that goes on in our Nation's capital. It should not be about
what makes the Democratic Party look good or bad or what makes the
Republican Party look good or bad. It ought to be about doing the right
thing by the people who sent us here to represent them. I believe there
are extremists in both parties. The Blue Dogs are trying to bring the
extreme sides of both parties to the middle to find some commonsense
solutions to the problems that face us here in America.
The administration requests to raise the debt limit by another $750
billion. Last year, the administration said we would not need to raise
the debt limit for at least 7 years. The administration even said that
there was a danger in paying down the debt too soon. I have not figured
that one out yet. And now the administration in their fiscal year 2003
budget puts us back in deficit spending by $100 billion, by creating
$100 billion in new debt, and I believe that is wrong. Raising the debt
limit, allowing our government to go further into debt, raids the
Social Security trust fund. It simply authorizes the government to
write another $750 billion in IOUs to the Social Security trust fund.
There are several problems with that. Most of us have loans at banks
or credit unions. When we go to the bank or credit union for a loan,
normally they want to know how we are going to pay it back, what terms,
how long it is going to take, how much the monthly payments are going
to be. But not our government. Our government simply writes another
IOU, and sticks it in the Social Security trust fund with no provision,
absolutely no provision, on how that money will ever be paid back. I
think that is wrong. That is why the first bill I filed as a Member of
Congress was a bill to tell the politicians in Washington to keep their
hands off the Social Security trust fund and, yes, to keep their hands
off the Medicare trust fund.
Let us talk about the debt, some $5.7 trillion in debt. A lot of
people do not want to talk about it. I think we should. We should not
only talk about it, we ought to pay that debt down. Why? Because we are
the ones that created it. At least the majority of the people in
America elected the politicians that created that debt. I think it is
wrong to pass it on to our children and our grandchildren.
$5.7 trillion this country is in debt tonight. What does that mean
for all of us? Some people in this country think we spend too much
money on food stamps. That is $2 billion a month. Some people in this
country think we spend too much money on foreign aid. That is $1
billion a month. We spend $1 billion every single day in America simply
paying interest, not principal, just interest, on the national debt.
How much is $1 billion? I put that in my calculator, and I get that
little E at the end. But I can tell you what really brought it home for
me. I was recently touring a brand new state-of-the-art elementary
school in Monticello, Arkansas. As the principal and some teachers took
me through that school, they mentioned that it cost $5 million to
build. And it hit me. You know, we could build 200 brand new state-of-
the-art elementary schools every single day in America simply with the
interest we are paying on the national debt. I am not advocating that
we do that, although there are some schools that need our help in a
very big way; but I think that demonstrates to all of us how much $1
billion a day in interest really is. Give me a couple of days of it,
and I can finish I-49 in Arkansas. Give me a week of it, I can build I-
69 across Arkansas. It is time we pay down the debt.
And something else, we must pay back the IOUs to the Social Security
trust fund. They already total $1 trillion. Let me tell you why that is
important to all of us. When Social Security was created, we had 30
people paying in for every one earning benefits. Sometime between 2011
and 2016, depending on whose numbers you want to believe, we are going
to have more people earning Social Security benefits than we are going
to have paying in to the Social Security trust fund. And everyone
agrees that by 2038, Social Security is broke. It is broke in 2038 even
if the $1 trillion in IOUs which, I might add, there is no provision on
how we are going to pay them back, it is broke in 2038 provided that $1
trillion in IOUs is paid back, even with them being paid back, not
counting the new $100 billion that the President and this
administration proposes that we take from the Social Security trust
fund and go back into the days of deficit spending. Despite all that,
if all that some way or the other gets paid back, Social Security is
still broke in 2038.
I have got a grandmother. My grandfather died when I was a year old.
My grandmother is now 91. But when he died, she first learned how to
drive a car. Then she got her GED, she moved to Little Rock, which is
about 100 miles from where we live; and she went to nursing school. She
came back to our hometown, and she worked tirelessly for about 20 years
as a nurse at our local hospital. My grandmother did not have the
benefit of a big retirement plan. She has lived from Social Security
check to Social Security check. I know what it is like for seniors to
try and live from Social Security check to Social Security check. That
is why I want to see us not increase the debt limit. That is why I want
to see the politicians in Washington stop raiding the Social Security
trust fund. That is why we need to not honor this request of raising
the debt limit. It is time for fiscal responsibility at our Nation's
capital.
Mr. STENHOLM. I thank my friends from Arkansas, both of them, for
making some very relevant points. One of the statements that the
gentleman from Arkansas (Mr. Ross) just made was that we need to tone
down the partisan rhetoric. That is what we are trying to do tonight.
That is why I will join the gentleman from Arizona (Mr. Kolbe) from the
other side tomorrow going before the Committee on Ways and Means in
which we will be saying to the Committee on Ways and Means, let us sit
down and begin to honestly and sincerely talk about what kind of a fix
we need to put in for Social Security so that it does not run into
financial difficulties in 2030. Let us start reasoning together.
I do not understand, and that is what the Blue Dogs said last year,
we ought to have had that discussion last year; but we did not. But it
is not too late. It is never too late for reasonable men and women,
elected by our constituents in our respective 435 districts. All of us
get here the same way. We get elected by a majority of the people in
our district. All of us are well-meaning. But every now and then you
vote for something that puts in place something that we think tonight
we would like to turn around.
{time} 2030
When you had a $5.6 trillion surplus last year, and you squander it
in 1 year, and we go back now back into the Social Security trust fund
for the next 10 years under the economic game plan we are under, I
would hope our friends on the other side would not say, ``there you go
again.''
All we are saying is we think, before we increase the debt ceiling,
we ought to make one more attempt to get a true balanced budget, to get
out of the
[[Page H683]]
Social Security trust fund and, even in an election year, have a
serious debate and discussion about how we would fix Social Security.
I have got a plan that I have joined with the gentleman from Arizona
(Mr. Kolbe) on. Others have plans. Anyone that stands on this floor and
criticizes the other person's idea without offering one of their own, I
do not think too highly of. But I would welcome an honest and serious
debate, and I hope at some time in the future we could use some special
orders in which we would actually have a discussion about what it is
that we are differing on.
Tonight, for example, I would welcome someone from the other side of
the aisle that would come over and say, you guys are all wet. Here is
what we are doing. I would welcome that. Maybe we can get into that.
Now I would like to yield to the gentleman from Utah (Mr. Matheson).
The gentleman from Utah is making a real mark here in the Congress. One
of the things I have appreciated is his understanding of energy,
because he kind of comes from that experience. But, also, just as my
two colleagues from Arkansas have been real leaders within the Blue Dog
Coalition for focusing on fiscal responsibility, so has the gentleman
of Utah.
Mr. MATHESON. Mr. Speaker, I thank my colleague from Texas, and I
appreciate him leading this discussion tonight on an issue that is so
important to me. It is important to the Blue Dog Coalition, but it
really ought to be important to all of us.
It was about 150 years ago that my great-great grandfather came to
the United States from Scotland. I have to say that I believe I
personally am true to my Scottish ancestry when it comes to money,
especially the people's money. I do not like deficits. I do not like
debt.
When I first decided to run for public office, I never had heard of
the Blue Dogs. I was a candidate working hard, talking about issues
that I thought were important and the notion of being fiscally
responsible, the notion of trying to pay down debt. That was really
important to me.
As I got involved in being a candidate, suddenly I heard about this
group called the Blue Dogs, and the more I heard about them, the more I
said, you know, those guys are saying a lot of the same things that
seem to make sense to me, and it has been a group that I am real proud
to associate with, for a number of reasons.
Number one, they have a reputation for caring very much about being
fiscally responsible. Number two, they also have a reputation for just
putting the cards on the table.
What I like about this group is that we try to get away from a lot of
the rhetoric, and we are real open to discussion. As the gentleman from
Texas (Mr. Stenholm) just said, if someone wants to disagree with us,
that is great. Let us invite that dialogue. Let us have a discussion
about how we can come together and come up with some good ideas from
both parties to be fiscally responsible.
I think the Blue Dog budget that was introduced a year ago was a real
responsible plan. It was a good idea, and we nearly won. We nearly did.
But we did not quite make it.
Now we find ourselves in a rather extraordinary circumstance compared
to 1 year ago. I recognize that there are a lot of changes in what this
country faces from a year ago, and we as Blue Dogs understand that we
face some new expenditures in our government right now.
We face a war on terrorism that costs money, and it is a serious
issue and something that we support. We face issues about homeland
security that we were not thinking about a year ago, and those are
going to take resources, too. We support that, and we want to take care
of those issues and address them in a responsible way.
To the extent that the economy is in a downturn and to the extent we
face some of these issues, we understand that there may be times,
extraordinary circumstances like that, when the government may have to
go into some deficit in the short term, and if we are coming right up
against that borrowing limit, it may be responsible to raise that up a
little bit to get us through this short-term problem we face here.
But that is not what we are looking at. That is not what the
administration is asking us to do. The administration is asking us to
raise the debt limit by $750 billion.
We throw so many numbers around this place, I think we grow numb to
the meaning of these numbers. But $750 billion in more debt? That is
just a lot of money and that is a big blank check that we are asking
for, that the administration is asking for; and, quite frankly, they
are asking for Congress to be given the latitude to run up another $750
billion of debt with no plan, with no financial plan, with no idea that
has been presented about how we are going to right this ship, how we
are going to get away from this pattern of just increasing debt over
and over and over.
That just does not seem to make sense. From my Southern Utah roots
that does not pass the smell test. We ought to be willing to be
responsible about this, and before we write a huge blank check, let us
take a look at the short-term issues, as I suggested. Let us be willing
to acknowledge that we ought to maybe increase the debt limit a little
bit, because we have these increased expenses from the war on
terrorism, homeland security.
The economy has been slow. We understand that. But, for crying out
loud, $750 billion, that is a lot of money.
I notice what the gentleman from Arkansas (Mr. Ross) was saying about
trying to get people a sense of what $1 billion means. I really like
that example of 200 elementary schools.
There is another part of that example that ought to be amplified, and
that is if you spent that money on 200 elementary schools, you would
have something to show for it. You would have an important asset, an
asset that creates value. It is an investment in our country, it is an
investment in our children, which is the best investment we can make.
But when we pay that interest payment, we have nothing, we have nothing
to show for it, every single day. I thought that was a great analogy to
point out, the difference in how you either spend money or invest
money.
There are things government should do, and there are some things
government should not do, but I think we ought to keep in mind the
notion that there is an investment component to what we do.
The gentleman from Arkansas (Mr. Ross) mentioned that he is a small
businessman. The gentleman from Texas (Mr. Stenholm) I know has been a
farmer. I am sure both of them in their lives had the experience of at
times borrowing money for their business. They have gone to the bank,
and they have had to tell a story, a legitimate, credible story about
how, if they are going to borrow that money, how they are going to put
it in that business and how that business is going to create some
recurring income over time to pay that loan off.
It has been my personal experience, too. I used to work in the energy
business, built a couple of cogeneration projects that cost $100
million apiece. I had to go to a bank to find that money to help build
that project. I will tell you, they made me jump through a lot of hoops
to explain how that project, once it was built, was going to pay for
itself over time. And we got that loan, and those projects are making
electricity and those loans are getting paid off because we told a
story that was credible, and I am glad to say it has worked out that
way as well.
The same thing applies to all of us. Everybody has gone out, maybe
they borrowed money to buy a car or a house. You cannot just walk in
and say, well, I have no idea how I am going to pay you back, but
please give me money.
Yet in terms of raising this debt limit, that is what we are talking
about. I know there is a lot of uncertainty when you look out in the
future. I understand the problems with long-term projections. We all
have to live with that uncertainty.
But that does not mean you just ignore the future. That does not mean
you do not try to give your best effort to figure out what you are
going to do in the future. As time goes on, you retool your plan to fit
changes that you did not expect.
But what we have now is this request to raise the debt limit by $750
billion, and there is no end in sight. There is no sense of how we are
going to ultimately change this pattern of deficit spending.
[[Page H684]]
That is why we are here tonight. That is what we are talking about.
We are trying to engage people in a dialogue.
I do not claim to have all the answers for how we are going to right
this ship. I really do not. I have some ideas. I think I have some good
ideas. But I think we have to be committed, collaboratively, as
Democrats and Republicans, and with the administration, too, to talk
these things through. These are serious issues. These are tough issues.
If they were simple, we would have resolved them already. And they got
more difficult in the past year. We have new challenges we were not
thinking about a year ago.
This is when we are supposed to rise to the occasion. This is why
people elect us. They elect us to come here, think these issues
through, learn all the facts, talk to as many experts as we can, and
work together to come up with viable, common-sense solutions.
That is what the Blue Dogs are all about. That is why I have been so
proud, as I said, to be associated with that group. Their reputation
speaks for itself. They have been very helpful in terms of guiding this
discussion. And that is why we are here tonight, to talk about this
issue of raising the debt limit.
I cannot say enough about how important this is. I think about this
issue through the eyes of my little boy who is 3 years old. He has
gotten no benefit out of this debt we have run up around this country,
none at all. But we are going to stick him with having to pay it off.
You know, as I take on this job and as I think about issues, I try to
look at all of these issues through the eyes of him, through the eyes
of a child, and think about what kind of world he is going to be
growing up in. It is just not fair. It is not right. Those kids do not
vote. They do not vote, but they are our constituents, and they are our
future. Those are the people we are supposed to be representing.
Mr. STENHOLM. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman from Utah for those
very pointed remarks. What we are talking about tonight is aimed at his
child, at my two grandsons, and that is all we are asking that we take
a look at.
I have been in this body now for going on 24 years. I have worked
with five presidents, and it matters not whether there is an R or D
after the president's name. It matters not whether that is an R or D
after any of my colleagues' name. If they have a good idea, I will join
in attempting to pass it, or at least attempting to discuss it.
Tomorrow I will join with our colleague, the gentleman from Arizona
(Mr. Kolbe), in which we will ask the Committee on Ways and Means to
tone down the rhetoric regarding Social Security. I will be equally
hard on my party, those who choose to get a little bit rambunctious
with the rhetoric on Social Security, as I will be equally hard on the
majority side. I am very critical of the majority for not taking up a
Social Security reform plan. I think that is legitimate.
I used to get blamed for a lot of things that happened when we were
in the majority on the Democratic side, but now it seems I still get
blamed for what is going on, even though I am in the minority.
Everyone tonight has stated the absolute importance of dealing with
the future of Social Security, and we are pointing out our belief that
you do not deal with the future of Social Security by digging the hole
deeper. When you have an unfunded liability in the Social Security
system tonight of $22 trillion, we do not believe it is a solution to
dig the hole to $23 trillion.
You do not really back up and get a running start out of a hole. When
you find yourself in a hole, the first rule is to quit digging. That
was the infamous words of Garfield. That is what we are saying tonight.
You do not just automatically borrow additional money unless you have
got a plan.
Our colleague talked about going and borrowing $100 million to
finance a cogeneration plant. It was a good investment or he would not
have gotten the money.
Tonight we are being asked to borrow additional money so we can pay
interest on that debt without doing anything to solve the problems of
this Nation. That is what bugs us. A lot of people say, well, you know,
are you all not being just a little inconsistent? Some might say, how
is the debt limit vote different this year from the last time?
Well, let me point out how it is different. We are being asked to
raise the debt limit outside of a plan for balance. The last two votes
that this body had to raise the debt limit came at a time when Congress
and the President were engaged in bipartisan negotiations on a balanced
budget plan that ultimately led to the Balanced Budget Agreement of
1997. The current situation is very different. The President has
submitted a budget which projects deficits financed by borrowing the
Social Security surplus for the next decade. I repeat, the plan that we
have been asked to put into place borrows the Social Security trust
fund for the next 10 years. That is not a plan we can support.
{time} 2045
Now, also we are going to hear, I hope we do not, but I have already
heard rumblings of this, that we need to change the manner in which we
determine what the numbers are. The last time this bill came up in
1997, we had a different President in the White House. The minority
leader of this body said, and I quote, ``We said from the beginning of
this Congress that we want to negotiate with the President, but we
cannot negotiate with a President that does not want to balance the
budget. We do not want to negotiate over whether to balance the budget
or not. We want him to submit a budget that balances by CBO.''
Now, here we are in danger of again doing, as we have seen happen a
few times over the years, we will either use OMB, that is the Office of
Management and Budget, that is the administration's budget arm, or we
will use the Congressional Budget Office, that is CBO, that is the
bipartisan congressional budget arm. We agreed several years ago that
we would use CBO; we, the Congress, agreed that CBO would be the
arbiter of what the numbers are. Not saying that they are automatically
right; not saying that they are any better than OMB, but since we often
have different assumptions, we just agreed that we would use CBO.
Now, I hope that the majority this year will stick to what we have
agreed to doing. We will use CBO, whatever they say because, remember,
these are projections. Let us not slip into using OMB when it works to
the advantage or CBO when it works to the advantage; let us use CBO.
Congress and the President need to sit down, roll up our sleeves and
have an honest discussion about what we need to do to put the budget
back in order with everything on the table. We need to put together an
honest plan, putting the budget on a reasonable glidepath toward
balance without using Social Security using CBO estimates. That is what
we are trying to say tonight.
In 1995, in 1995, 48 Democrats joined with the Republican majority to
insist that President Clinton submit a plan that was balanced under CBO
numbers. We hope that the 148 Republicans who voted for that
legislation, who are still in the House, will stay consistent. Those 48
of us on our side of the aisle do intend to stay consistent. We believe
that since we, over the last 8 years, got our Nation's fiscal house in
order, eliminated the deficits as far as the eye could see, actually
got ourselves into surplus for 1 year, that all of the pain and anguish
that has been caused or was caused or was utilized in order to
accomplish that goal for our country should not be squandered in 12
months.
Now, is that an overly partisan statement to make? I would hope not.
I listen very carefully to my colleagues on the other side of the
aisle. They say, and I believe it sincerely, as we do, that that is
what they want to do. But we cannot do it on this side of the aisle
unless they do it. We are in the minority. When we are in the minority,
we do not have 218 votes.
Now, I want to repeat, we are not playing politics with this issue.
We are not. We will vote for a short-term debt ceiling, provided there
is a plan of how to get from where we are to where we need to be. We do
not think that is too much to ask of the majority. We are willing to
put our money where our mouth is. We are willing to vote on a temporary
increase on the debt limit
[[Page H685]]
to meet the expenses of the war. We are willing to do that. What we are
not willing to do is give a $750 billion blank check to continue on an
economic game plan that has already squandered $5 trillion of projected
surpluses in one year. We do not think that is unreasonable. But we did
not think our budget last year was unreasonable either. We put forth
our best effort on the floor, and we lost. And when we lose, we go on
to the next battle. Well, the next battle is now. The next battle is
now.
Now, again, in case someone is just now joining us, on the debt
limit, I used one example, and I will use another. On the debt limit,
it is kind of like going into one of our best restaurants in Texas and
enjoying one of our infamous Texas beef steaks, enjoying it, and then
walking out and saying we are not going to pay for it. That is what the
debt ceiling is all about. The other example is a businessman in
trouble because of unforeseen difficulties, but has a good record. We
have a lot of farmers in that condition right now out in the country
that, through no fault of their own, they are finding it difficult to
pay back their banker. To go back to the banker, the banker knows them,
and they make adjustments. They make adjustments in their economic game
plan. They make adjustments in their budgets. We cut back here; we do
things a little differently. We tighten our belt. Well, that is what we
are asking. We just do not believe it makes common sense to arbitrarily
say to our country, we are going to borrow $750 billion on a game plan
that has squandered $5 trillion of surpluses.
Now, I think it was very important that the gentleman from Utah (Mr.
Matheson) a moment ago acknowledged the war. I have said three times
tonight, we are perfectly willing, and we are 110 percent behind our
President, regarding the conduct of the war. Separate that issue from
what we are talking about tonight. We will do what is necessary to make
sure that our young men and women have the tools necessary, both now
and in the future, to do what they are called on to do, and that is
defend the freedom of this country. We will do that. That is not what
we are talking about tonight. I hope that as we get closer and closer
to that vote on the debt ceiling, that we will make a few changes in
that economic game plan. We will be proposing how we would do it. We
have already proposed how we would do it. We told our colleagues last
year how we could do it, but we lost.
I want to conclude my remarks tonight by going back again to the
Social Security question. I want to make it very, very clear. This is
one Member on this side of the aisle that has happened to agree with
the President regarding his proposal for individual accounts. I have
joined with the gentleman from Arizona (Mr. Kolbe) on that for the last
6 years. We have introduced, reintroduced and reintroduced for the
third time our suggestion of how we can, in fact, make Social Security
as sound or even sounder for our children and grandchildren. I am
perfectly willing to discuss and debate that issue until the cows come
home, and if we could get a majority, we win; if not, somebody will
beat us with a better idea.
What I am deeply concerned about is on my side of the aisle critics
talking about Social Security without offering their own plan. We will
find no one anywhere in the United States tonight that says that Social
Security will be there for our grandchildren without making some
changes. No one. No one on it today should be concerned for one second
about their Social Security check. But for my grandsons, 6\1/2\ and
4\1/2\ years old, we had better start getting concerned about their
Social Security if Congress continues to not do what we need to do in
coming up with a plan to reform it.
That is why even if, even if 9-11-01 had not occurred, we still would
be standing here tonight saying the economic game plan that we are
under, we ought to change. I repeat: even if 9-11-01 had not occurred,
we would still be having the discussion that we are having tonight,
based on the estimates of CBO and OMB. That is something that people
need to understand.
Again, I want to make it very, very clear. The Blue Dogs have taken
this hour tonight to say that we are willing to support a temporary
increase to meet our expenses, but only a temporary increase. I think
we need to keep this Congress's feet to the fire, and we need to make
the tough decisions, hopefully starting with at least beginning a
dialogue on Social Security this year, without elevating the rhetoric
and attempting to win elections this November based on someone pointing
a finger at the other side and suggesting that one side is going to
bankrupt the system and the other side has all the answers without ever
saying what their answer would be.
I will join with the gentleman from Arizona (Mr. Kolbe) and others,
the gentleman from Michigan (Mr. Smith) on the other side of the aisle,
for example, the gentleman from Florida (Mr. Boyd) on my side, and the
gentlewoman from Missouri (Ms. McCarthy), and others who have been a
part of coming up with a constructive solution; we will join. I just do
not think it is too much to ask of the majority to spend a little bit
of time in serious legislation on the most serious problem facing us,
other than the war, and that is the future of Social Security. We are
going to have a lot more to say about it in the days and weeks ahead,
and I thank my colleagues for their indulgence tonight.
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